Sick As Hell
by GoldenGait
Summary: Cameron's last clinic patient of the day is the final straw...


Sick As Hell

By GoldenGait

Author's Note: With an extremely Heroes-less drought in effect until the beginning of the third season, I have found refuge in House MD. Just started watching, and this little one-shot popped into my head while I was doing laundry, and—poof!—an hour later it's written. I love those organic moments of story writing.

Disclaimer: I own nothing, I'm just a fan of the long suffering team under House.

--

Cameron walked into the treatment room, barely looking up from the patient's chart she had in her hand. She'd agreed to take (oh, who was she kidding—been ordered to take) the extra clinic hours House had been saddled with as his latest punishment, so she had been seeing patients since seven that morning without so much as a snack break. She's managed to sneak into a bathroom once around eleven, but it was well into the afternoon and she was hoping this could be her last visit of the day. The boys—House, Foreman, Chase, and Wilson—were all upstairs discussing the latest incredibly interesting case House had snatched away from some other physician, and Cameron tried not to resent being stuck with all-day clinic duty. It didn't help that today had been One Of Those Days—the crazies seemed to be out in force. She was hoping this patient would be relatively straightforward.

She squinted at the nurse's bad handwriting and tried to decipher her patient's chief complaint. 25 yo nonDM AAM, CC LE pain 5/10. Cameron sighed. 'Lower extremity pain.' How wonderfully vague.

"Mr. Modine, I see you're here because your leg's been hurting. Right leg, or left leg?" Cameron asked, slipping on some gloves. She looked down with dismay at the baggy latex. Why did they only stock these clinic rooms with size large? Examinations were always harder when you had to wrestle to keep your gloves from falling off.

"Yeah, yeah, it's my right one, doc, it's been hurtin' like crazy since last night." Mr. Modine ran a hand over his corn rows in frustration. "I just wanted to come in and make sure it's not gonna be a problem with my other condition."

"And the nurse said you rated the pain as a five out of ten?"

"Yeah, yeah, not too bad. I've had worse."

Cameron jotted some notes down in the chart before continuing her questions. "So you've experienced this kind of pain before?"

"Yes, ma'am."

"How often?"

"Once in 2003, and once back in '98 or '99, don't really remember…"

"And what are you usually doing when the pain starts?"

"Mindin' my own business," Mr. Modine said somewhat defensively.

"Okay," Cameron said with a hint of confusion. The patient was glaring at her from the exam table, and Cameron felt it was time for a slight subject change. "You said you have another condition you think the pain might be related to?"

"No, not related to, but I want to know it's not going to affect it."

"And what is the condition?"

"I'm sick as hell."

Cameron lifted her eyes from the patient's chart and stopped writing. "Right," she said. "Uh, with what?"

"That sick as hell disease. My last doc said I had that. Sick as hell, he said."

"Okay, but sick with what?"

"Listen, doc, this is gonna take a long time if you're going to play games with me. I'm a _sick as hell patient_."

It occurred to Cameron that House may have set her up for this, a practical joke patient for the end of her day, one more little piece of torture. But, shaking off the momentary bout of distrust in the human race, she went on, "All right. Do you remember the name of the disease?"

"Jesus, woman, you are _dense_. I just told you!"

"What is it?"

"Sick as hell!"

Cameron closed her eyes and tried not to laugh, scream, or walk out of the treatment room. "Okay, we can figure this out. Are you HIV positive? Do you have some form of cancer? Hepatitis?"

"No, I got none of that, why are you asking me about those other diseases?"

"I'm sorry, I'm just trying to narrow it down to the condition you're talking about. You said it's a very serious condition? That makes you very, very sick?"

"Yeah, it can. Sometimes it flares up."

"And what happens when it flares up?" Cameron prodded gently.

"I make them—I make them all sick as hells."

"So you're contagious?" Cameron wondered whether she needed to be in a gown and mask, under contact precautions.

"No, I'm not contagious!" The patient slammed a hand down on the exam table. "Are you tryin' to pull somethin' with me? This isn't funny, doc, I don't think this is funny at all!"

"I just need to know what your other condition is!" Cameron's voice rose up without her permission and she found herself standing with clenched fists at her side as Mr. Modine looked at her like she was completely crazy and yelled back at her.

"_Sick….as…HELL_!"

The door to the treatment room opened and House limped in, slamming the door shut behind him. "Dr. Cameron, we need you upstairs. How much time do you intend to waste down here today shouting at patients while your colleagues pick up your slack upstairs trying to find out what is wrong with a very nice little girl who could be dead in a week?"

Cameron's lips were pursed, and she had to count to five before she felt her voice would be steady enough to respond. "I can come upstairs as soon as I am finished with Mr. Modine, but at the moment he doesn't feel it's important to tell me the name of his pre-existing condition that may or may not have some affect on his current leg pain," she said in what she hoped was a slow and measured tone.

House rolled his eyes. "Oh, for God's sake, I could hear from down the hall that the man has sickle cell anemia."

Cameron's face blanched as House swept past her, bumping her shoulder as he leaned his weight into his cane. "And what is the source of your leg pain, sir?" House asked the patient.

"I got shot." Mr. Modine lifted a pant leg to reveal a deep gash along his calf muscle.

"Yes, yes you did. The good news is the bullet just grazed you, this should heal with a very cool scar, and should not cause a sickle cell attack. The bad news is you're in the wrong part of the hospital for that to be treated today—we're going to need you to go to the ER to get a tetanus booster and have the wound cleaned and bandaged. Sorry about the confusion—female doctors..." House rolled his eyes as if he didn't feel the need to expand on the sentiment any further.

House spun around and limped quickly back out of the room, Cameron jogging up behind him after a moment. "I'm sorry, I didn't think he was—"

"You didn't even _look _at his leg before you started that raging PMS storm in there, did you?"

"I was taking a history first—"

"_No_, you were getting distracted and defensive. What happened today? You're not your usual sunshine-and-pancakes self."

"I've been down in that clinic since--!"

House interrupted her as he strode out of the elevator towards his office. "I'm sorry, that was a rhetorical question, I didn't actually need that answered." He swung the door open, not bothering to hold it for Cameron as she stumbled in behind him.

"What happened to you?" Foreman asked Cameron, his eyes raking over her disheveled appearance and the vaguely hysterical look on her face.

Cameron's eyebrows shot up her forehead and she opened her mouth to respond, but nothing came out. "Clinic," she finally managed.

--

Additional author's note: An explanation of the medical sentence describing Mr. Modine… 25 year old non-diabetic African American male with the chief complaint of lower extremity pain rated on the pain scale as 5/10.

My favorite thing in the entire world is getting reviews… If you like, if you don't like, whatever—let me know!

GG


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